by Ben Bova
“Then please explain to me,” he said, very firmly, “why Max is not here having dinner with us.”
MISSION CONTROL CENTER
Linda Vishnevskaya had allowed Max Yeager to sit at one of the consoles. It was better than having him hover over her, breathing down her neck.
The control center was deserted except for the two of them. Nothing had been heard from Faraday since the unexpected data capsule had popped out of the clouds the day before. Another capsule was expected at noon today.
Yeager sat impatiently at the console, reviewing all over again the data that the last capsule had carried. The sharks’ attacks had ended when Faraday backed away. The vessel was safe as long as it kept away from the predators.
How far away? Yeager asked himself. How close can she get before those damned monsters attack her again? They didn’t do any damage, but she’s not designed to be a punching bag for those monsters. She can take the g forces of flying through the atmosphere and dropping into the ocean, but that bludgeoning from the sharks is different. If they keep battering at her like that something’s going to shake loose sooner or later.
The sharks are looking for the leviathans, Yeager understood. Those big whales are the sharks’ food. So if we can just trail the sharks for a while, we ought to come upon the leviathans. Sooner or later. Better be sooner. She’s due to leave the ocean and fly back here in another thirty-two hours.
Yeager realized that Vishnevskaya was standing over him. He almost chuckled at the incongruity of their sizes. Standing, she was just about eye level with him while he was seated.
“When is the last time you had a decent meal?” she asked him.
Shrugging, “I dunno. I grabbed a sandwich a little bit ago.”
“That was this morning. It’s now almost dinner time.”
“I’m not hungry.”
She wrinkled her nose. “When’s the last time you took a shower?”
He frowned.
“Max,” she said, resting a hip on a corner of the console’s desktop, “it’s no use sitting here hour after hour. You can’t help your baby. She’s doing fine down there.”
“She might pop another capsule.”
Vishnevskaya leaned across the console’s keyboard and clicked its power switch. The screens went dark.
“Whattaya—”
“Max, little father, I am pulling rank on you. As director of flight operations I order you to get the hell out of here.”
Yeager blinked at her. This tiny golden-haired pixie, standing with her fists planted on her slim hips, her violet eyes steady, unwavering …
“You’re ordering me?”
“That’s right. Leave the control center. Get yourself a decent meal. If anything happens I will call you immediately.”
“You’re ordering me.” Max didn’t know whether to laugh or scream at her.
“Out. Now.” She pointed toward the doors. As Yeager pushed himself up from the console’s chair she added, “And take a shower!”
* * *
Faraday glided through the dark, turbulent sea, keeping as far from the pack of predators as it could while still observing their position with its longest-ranged sensors.
The predators were moving purposefully, steadily, in one direction, massed into a column. Central computer’s human analog program pulled up an image of an army of human soldiers marching along a barren, war-ravaged plain.
They could go faster, central computer concluded. In their attacks on Faraday itself they had certainly showed much more speed. But now they were coasting along almost leisurely as they moved ever deeper into the hotter depths. The safety program showed that the vessel was approaching the design limit on depth, but so far the increasing pressure and external temperature had not caused any problems. So far.
Suddenly the sharks veered off to the left. Sensors showed that a huge formation of leviathans was moving slowly out there, so far distant that it was difficult to discriminate individual bodies among the mass.
Why were the predators moving away from their prey? Central computer pondered this question for more than a full second, while simultaneously questioning the decision tree program about firing off another data capsule to report this unexpected behavior.
The decision tree concluded that the predators’ behavior did not in itself warrant launching a fresh data capsule. But the priority directive flared in central computer’s list of objectives: Observe the leviathans. With the predators distracted, even temporarily, Faraday obeyed its programming and sped toward the massive assemblage of leviathans. This was an opportunity that it could not resist.
* * *
Katherine Westfall tapped her foot impatiently on the plush carpeting of her sitting room. Those fools! She said to herself. Those doddering old fools!
The latest message from IAA headquarters on Earth had her seething with frustrated anger. The council was divided on the question of forbidding Dr. Archer to send a crewed mission into Jupiter’s ocean. Split almost evenly down the middle, nine in favor of banning the mission, seven against the motion. Westfall’s own vote would make it ten to seven, but the chairman of the council—a geriatric case who should have been put out to pasture long ago, in Westfall’s view—ruled that the vote fell one short of the two-thirds majority needed for such a critical decision.
Two-thirds majority! Westfall wanted to throw something, she was so angry. She actually picked up a small decorative vase from the end table by the couch and raised her hand, but stopped herself.
The chairman was a scientist, she knew. Undoubtedly a friend of Archer’s, or at least he’s in sympathy with a fellow scientist’s aim. Westfall shook her head. They don’t care about who has to risk her life. Who might get killed. They’re blind to the risks: All they want is to learn new knowledge, regardless of the costs.
She carefully replaced the vase on the end table and sat herself on the couch, trying to relax the tension that was knotting her like a rope.
And what do you want? she asked herself. Retribution for your sister’s death? Don’t kid yourself. You never really knew her. She’s an excuse, not a reason. Why do you want to stop Archer? The answer flashed in her mind immediately: Because Grant Archer is in line for membership on the governing council. And once he’s on the council he could swiftly rise to the chairmanship. He’s that kind of person: quiet, unassuming, friendly—and single-minded in his determination to put science ahead of everything else. He won’t seem to want the chairmanship, Westfall knew. He’ll act surprised when they offer it to him. But he’ll take it. Oh yes, he’ll take it and run the council his way and I’ll be just another member out in the cold, without any real power.
Westfall felt a pang of fear clutching at her innards. She remembered her mother telling her over and over, You’re not really safe unless you’re on top. You’ve got to be in command, otherwise they can walk all over you. Clenching her tiny fists, she told herself, I’ve got to stop Archer, one way or another.
She stared at the empty armchair across the coffee table. Only a few hours ago Deirdre Ambrose had sat in that chair and dutifully reported that Archer was encouraging her to become part of the crew that was going down into the ocean.
Westfall could see that Deirdre was clearly afraid of the idea. But they’ll cajole her into going, she knew. They’ll make it clear that if she wants any kind of a career in scientific research she’ll have to do what they tell her. They’ll kill her, just like they killed Elaine.
Suddenly Westfall broke into a smile. Of course! What a fool I’ve been, she said to herself. I’ve been battering at them to no avail. Archer is determined to send a crew into the ocean. He has his friends on the IAA council and elsewhere in the scientific community; they’ll let him get away with it.
And when the mission fails, when those people in the crew are maimed or killed, Archer will be blamed for it. Of course! Westfall almost laughed aloud at the simplicity of it. Let him send them! He’ll be writing his own resignation. They’ll be killed an
d it will be easy to see that I’ve been right all along. Then they’ll cancel all this nonsense of human missions into Jupiter’s ocean. Then Archer will resign in disgrace—or be fired by the IAA council. Then I can cut their research budget down to where it should be and stop all this nonsense of trying to talk with those alien monsters.
Then I can be elected chairman of the council, as I should be.
She actually did laugh out loud. “And then I can purge the obstructionists off the IAA council! I’ll fill the board with my own people and make those scientists dance to my tune!”
LEVIATHAN
Leviathan’s sensor parts saw the lights flashing back and forth among the Elders, deep in the core of the Kin’s spherical formation. None of its nearby companions lit up; whatever the Elders were discussing was not being transmitted to the others of the Kin.
The darters were still out there, trailing the Kin at a long distance, just barely within sensor range. They wouldn’t attack the entire family of us, Leviathan thought. We could crush them if they tried to.
But hunger is a powerful force. Leviathan felt it gnawing at its own parts. If the Elders don’t lead us to a new stream of food soon, Leviathan knew, members of the Kin will begin to dissociate, unable to control their starving parts. And once that begins the darters will swoop in and feast.
A message was flashing from one member of the Kin to another, making its way outward from the Elders toward the edge of their formation. When at last Leviathan saw the message glaring from the flank of its nearest fellow, it felt stunned.
The Eldest had decided to leave the group and go off alone to dissociate. Suicide, Leviathan knew. The darters would swarm all over it as soon as it separated itself from the Kin. But the Eldest was firm in its decision. It was willing to sacrifice itself so that the Kin could get away from the darters; willing to allow the predators to devour its parts while the rest of the Kin fled to safety.
Nothing like this had ever happened within Leviathan’s memory. Leviathan protested, flashing a message urging the Elders to turn on the darters and drive them away. We are much stronger than they! Leviathan signaled. We can fight them without sacrificing any of our members.
But the Eldest signaled back, No. Better that one dies and the rest of the Kin survive. There must be new currents of food nearby. Find them while the darters are busy feasting. Grow strong and have many buddings.
Leviathan felt helpless in the face of the Eldest’s decision. Suddenly its sensor parts shrilled an alarm. An alien! Leviathan’s brain recognized what the sensors had detected. One of the strange, cold alien creatures was approaching the Kin. But this one was much larger than any of the previous aliens. Almost as big as a full-grown darter.
Leviathan flashed the information inward toward the Elders. Quickly their reply came back: Ignore the alien. It cannot help us or change what must be.
But Leviathan wondered, Is the alien helping the darters? Is the alien the reason why the food stream disappeared and the darters have grown so bold?
III
PREPARATIONS
If everything is under control, you are going too slow.
—Mario Andretti
IMMERSION CENTER
Deirdre had never swum before. Living in the Chrysalis II habitat, the nearest thing to a swimming pool had been an ancient bathtub that her father had imported at tremendous cost from London. The nearest lake or seashore was some three hundred million kilometers away, on Earth.
Even when she made contact with the dolphins she stayed out of the water, under Andy Corvus’s encouraging direction. She experienced what Baby felt like swimming effortlessly through the big aquarium tank, but she had never gotten herself wet.
So she felt more than a little trepidation as she approached the immersion center, Andy at her side. Deirdre had searched station Gold’s storerooms for something to wear in the immersion tank and found a black maillot which, the logistics clerk assured her, was considered very fashionable swimwear back Earthside. It had been left at the station by a planetary physicist who had gotten herself pregnant and transferred back to Selene.
Wearing a white terry cloth robe over the one-piece swimsuit, Deirdre had gone with Andy down to the immersion center.
“Nervous?” he had asked her as they walked along the passageway.
“A little,” she admitted, shaving the truth considerably.
“I’ll have to go through this, too, you know.”
“I know.”
“But not today,” Corvus said. For once, Andy looked dead serious. As they walked down the passageway leading to the immersion center, his slightly uneven face was set in a tight expression of concern.
Deirdre said, “I watched some videos last night of people scuba diving back on Earth. It looked like fun.”
“It’s fun swimming with the dolphins,” he said, trying to sound brighter.
They reached the double-door entrance to the immersion center. Corvus reached for both handles and slid the doors open.
“Well, after you’re finished they want me to go in,” he said.
Deirdre smiled gently at him. I’ll be the test subject for you, she said to herself. After you see me get through it, then you’ll have the courage to do it yourself. But then she thought, If everything goes right. If there aren’t any problems.
Half a dozen people were waiting for them by the immersion tank. Deirdre saw what looked like a modest-sized swimming pool, glowing with light from below its surface that cast strange rippling shadows on the overhead.
But Dorn was nowhere in sight. The cyborg had promised Deirdre that he’d be present to lend her moral support. But he wasn’t there. Deirdre felt disappointed, almost betrayed.
A short, stocky, dark-skinned man in a crisp white laboratory coat came up to her and brusquely extended his hand to Deirdre.
“I am Dr. Vavuniva,” he said. “I am in charge here.”
“Deirdre Ambrose.”
“Yes. Of course.” Vavuniva looked cranky, impatient frown lines creasing his forehead. His dark eyes shifted toward Corvus. “And you?”
“Andy Corvus. I’m scheduled for a dunking this afternoon.”
“Dunking?” Vavuniva snapped. “This is not a frivolous matter, Dr. Corvus.”
“No,” Andy quickly agreed. “Of course not.”
A pretty young woman with a digital clipboard stepped between Deirdre and Dr. Vavuniva. Deirdre saw that she was wearing a colorful flowered dress beneath her white lab coat. She was no taller than Deirdre’s own shoulder, and there was a delicate little flower tattooed on her golden cheek.
“You have viewed the orientation video?” she asked, proffering the clipboard.
“Yes,” Deirdre said, nodding as she signed the form with the attached stylus.
The other technicians were all men, mostly young: Deirdre’s own age, she thought. One of them, a gangling blond youngster, seemed hardly out of his teens. He was staring openly at her. Deirdre smiled at him, and the youngster actually blushed.
Corvus stepped up and put himself between Deirdre and the technician, frowning at the kid. Oh Andy, Deirdre thought, none of the guys can get within ten meters of me without you or Dorn or Max shooing them away. She sighed inwardly. It’s good to have protectors, but still …
The young technician opened the gate in the railing that circled the pool. “This way, Ms. Ambrose,” he said.
The Polynesian woman handed her a belt of weights. “You’ll need this,” she said softly. “We’ve adjusted it for your weight.”
Deirdre thanked her and, opening her robe slightly, slipped the belt around her waist and clicked its catch. She stepped up to the gate, then pulled off her robe. The young technician gaped at her. She heard one of the other men whistle softly. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Andy bristling.
Vavuniva seemed angered by it all. “Into the tank,” he said brusquely.
As she pulled her snug-fitting hood over her hair, Deirdre smiled at the men’s reaction. Her swimsuit
covered her from neck to crotch, although her arms and legs were bare. The suit was dead black but fit her snugly. She could feel her nipples straining against the fabric. Stepping over the rim of the pool and putting a foot into the water, she felt disappointed that nobody in the whole station had been able to make a pass at her since she’d arrived. Except for Max, of course, but he didn’t really count: Max was all talk.
She glanced over her shoulder at Andy, who was now himself staring goggle-eyed at her. Good! Deirdre thought. He’s got normal male reactions.
The water felt cold. As Deirdre started to climb down the ladder she remembered that this wasn’t really water, it was liquid perfluorocarbon. She was going to have to breathe in it.
The pretty Polynesian woman leaned over the railing and reminded her, “You’ll gag at first. Everybody does. It’s a normal reflex. Don’t panic. Just try to relax and breathe as normally as you can.”
Deirdre nodded, thinking that it’s easy to give advice. I wonder if she’s ever gone into this soup. I wonder if any of them have. I’ll bet that officious little Dr. Vavuniva’s never even put a toe in this stuff.
The liquid was chilling, and somehow cloying, slimy. Deirdre forced herself to slowly descend the ladder, rung by rung. The liquid came up to her hips, her waist, her breasts, her shoulders. Another step and it’ll be over my head, she realized.
Glancing up, she saw Vavuniva’s dark face looking nettled, annoyed. And Andy beside him, watching her with his soft blue eyes, looking as if he’d lean over and pull her out if he thought that’s what she wanted.
She smiled at Andy, then ducked her head into the liquid. The hood kept her hair dry. She blinked her eyes and found that she could see perfectly well. She held her breath, though. All well and good to claim that you could breathe this liquid, but Deirdre’s body didn’t really believe that.